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Rigoberto González: Macho outsiders populate Gilb's new collection

by Rigoberto González / Special to the Times

Posted:
10/23/2011 12:00:00 AM MDT

The lives of Chicano men caught in the struggle between the classes is the dominant theme of Dagoberto Gilb's resonant third collection of stories, "Before the End, After the Beginning" (Grove Press, $24 hardcover).

For the penny-pinching musician in "Cheap," what begins as an effort to save money on having a room painted turns out to be a battle with his conscience as he witnesses a contractor's exploitation of undocumented workers. The bilingual musician can speak to all parties involved, yet nobody's able to translate his good intentions when he makes kind gestures toward the Mexican workers and attempts to teach the Anglo boss that "you and me are lucky to be born on the rich side of the border." As a middle-class Chicano, he's perceived by all as a disengaged outsider.

This sense of otherness that surprises men in a state of class displacement is present in other stories. In "Blessing," a man sets off on an impulsive visit to his ex-girlfriend, who has married well. But his presence in a nice neighborhood arouses suspicion: "The SWAT team has to come and surround el rancho because some dirty Mexican is sniffing around a man's ruca."

In "To Document," a man with a rich girlfriend finds himself affronted when they meet a couple of sex-starved swingers who also want to go on "an adventure ride" with a Latin lover. In "The Last Time I Saw Junior," the narrator is now a successful professional, but that doesn't stop Junior, his drug dealer friend, from tricking him into intimidating a buyer with his "scary Mexican" physique.

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In Gilb's stories, Chicanos are easily dispossessed of economic or political power, reduced to the threatening yet appealing macho stereotype, a role-play that Chicanos themselves activate to maintain self-esteem.

As in the story "Willows Village," in which Billy, down on his luck, unemployed and soon to be a father for the second time, moves in with his Aunt Maggy, his mother's attractive younger sister. His frustrated job search doesn't get in the way of his sex drive and soon he finds himself making out on the couch with his aunt's guest and peeping on his naked aunt: "I couldn't stop myself from looking, even though I knew it was sick, or something kind of bad, but I didn't want to not watch."

Hyper-masculine behavior from the otherwise emasculated male is yet another demonstration of vulnerability. A second instance occurs in the opening story, "please, thank you," in which a man devastated by a paralyzing stroke clings to his manhood by flirting with a young nurse.

Gilb explores fresh territory with "Before the End, After the Beginning": for the middle-aged, middle-class Chicano (neither young or old, rich or poor, Mexican or American), upward mobility is more of a zigzag. The dust never settles, and the man exists in a state of perpetual discomfort because -- like burly Texan Ramiro, who rents a low-ceilinged room in the story "Hacia Teotitlán -- "he didn't fit" completely into a single box.

Rigoberto González is an award-winning writer living in New York City. His website is rigobertogonzalez.com, and he may be reached at Rigoberto70@aol.com.

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